The Weekend Stuffs

Another weekend gone. Sho, the weeks just seem to be flying by these days. But I will say that, right now at 7am on a Monday morning, I am feeling quiet upbeat about this week ... it is still fresh with possibility :)

Friday evening started the weekend off perfectly with ... nothing! Which is exactly, exactly, what I needed. I went home, the weather had turned all rainy so the bunnies couldn't really have their usual outside run-around time so I settled straight in with some new series. And there I stayed, aside from a minor break to make some yummy tomato soup and cheese toast for dinner. It was the perfect end to a crappy week.

Saturday was slightly more energetic. I was up and let the bunnies run around in the morning. And then headed back to bed to watch some more series (you will notice the trend by the end of the post ;) ). Eventually I got up and headed off to Mugg&Bean in Sandton to meet up with The Bunny Farmer for lunch (she was up in Joburg for about 24hrs to go to whatever expo was on at the Dome this weekend). Was awesome being able to catch up in person again :)

And then I went and wandered the mall ... well quiet a few malls as I whiled away my afternoon. Bought some new tops, but otherwise that was the extent of it.

And then I went to watch the Stormer's game with Beukes, CollegeInstructor and another friend of ours. Was great since the Stormers had such a fun game (bu that I mean, they won, the other team didn't score *at all* and they got a bonus point, yay). And then I headed home for ... you guessed it, more series!

On Sunday RubyLetters & I met for breakfast at JB's Corner in Melrose Arch. Was so lovely seeing her again and catching up in person :) After that I headed home to collect my cuttings and CollegeInstructor and we went investment-house-hunting.

> Follow RubyLetters on Twitter:

Would you believe I've actually found 2 places that I am keen to buy ... am now just trying to weigh each one up. Both are studio apartments, actually in complexes right next door to each other, so they are the exact same area. They are roughly the same price (well, depending on what the owner of Unit One is willing to accept, but my offer would be roughly the same as Unit Two's price). Unit Two is slightly bigger (smaller balcony too).

Unit One	Unit Two
+ Garden Unit	+ Top Floor Unit
- Would have to pay transfer costs etc.	+ Buying straight from Developer, so no transfer costs etc.
+ Already has a *private* tenant (am waiting to hear how much rent she is paying and if she is keen to stay)	- Would have to find a tenant and it seems rental management fees are quite a bit (close to 10%)!

Looking at it laid out above, I think aside from "The Tenant Factor", Unit Two is probably the better buy for me. But there is, in my mind, something to be said for already having a happy tenant in place, depending on what they are paying, of course. Which hopefully I should find out today. This really could be it, folks :) Ps. did I tell you the tenant in Unit One has the most gorgeous furniture? The whole place has been done in an almost Nouveau Victorian style and it's gorgeous!

After that I cleaned the bunny hutch and then spent the rest of the evening relaxing with some series.

See, after last week I really craved the escapism of series and managed to cram it into every nook and cranny of the weekend. I'm convinced that's why I am feeling rested and relaxed this morning and ready for this week.

It's Never Over

So last night was pretty cool, although spending that long at work was quite honestly exhausting and I won't be doing it again soon!

But we had a bunch of people over and we had a great evening (I won't be going into details of this new club we've started, but let me give you a brief idea: The American TV Season is just getting started. A lot of people watch downloaded series. It really doesn't make sense for everyone to use lots of expensive South African bandwidth all downloading the same shows).

Either way it was our first meeting and everyone who didn't already know each other really seemed to get on and I look forward to next month :)

In other news, I am having a nightmare dealing with Bean. I am so completely fed up with things. I have been ignoring his emails since Monday but eventually yesterday I just couldn't anymore. Let me outline the story for those of you who may not have been reading since word go.

So way back when he & I were still dating, we bought a property (the unit above the one we lived in together) ... This was in March/May 2006 and a spur-of-the-moment decision, the house was on show, we went up to have a look round and later that afternoon we were signing an offer to purchase.

Eventually, I think in about August 2006, by the time we were already on the rocks, transfer came thru and we took ownership of the unit as well as it's long-term tenant. In the December, we broke up. In March / May (always get those M months confused!) 2007, he moved over to London and we decided it wasn't worth yet selling the property as we'd almost certainly make a loss. At that stage things with it were very easy, we had a tenant paying the bulk of the monthly bond repayment and they paid on time.

Everything changed in November 2007, the tenant stopped paying her rent in a timely fashion and since then it has been a downward spiral of what I have had to handle regarding this "investment" of ours. My fury comes at the fact that he hasn't done a thing to ease the process ... he's all the way in London, what could he possibly do? Now yes, party my mistake for agreeing to not sell before he left and saying I'd look after things for us. But, I think I've handled it all pretty well with only a few knocks to my personal sanity. But I am now completely fed up and it is all unfolding via email.

As I said I bit my tongue for the first few days of this week, not replying to his emails. I figured that sending business-related emails while furious was probably not in my best interest. So eventually yesterday I replied. Calmly and directly. Not wildly exaggerating, not saying I'd done everything, but rather listing all the things I'd done in an orderly fashion.

a) I had to deal with the late rental payments. (This has been well documented!) Yes, I occasionally (once or twice in 5 months I think) asked you to contact Dudu but all you really did was speak to her and get the same answer I did: "She'll pay tomorrow" or "she'll pay by the end of the week". But it didn't affect your bank balance at the end of the day, nor did you have to deal with the extremely infuriating man (her son / husband who knows?) who paid for her the one month and was shouting at me over the phone at least 3 times in one month.

b) I had to deal with lawyers regarding the possible eviction proceedings and personally take letters round to be signed etc. more than once

c) I had to organise to get the plumbers in to fix the leak in the kitchen ceiling.

d) I had to handle the entire process of selling the house (dealing with private property requests, annoying estate agents etc.)

e) I had to organise to deliver & collect keys when also getting the Electrical Certificate required for the sale.

f) Once sold, I had to deal constantly with the lawyer once you conveniently signed over your power of attorney.

g) Even now, once the sale has gone thru, I'm still the one who now has to go over, have a look at the damage to the ceiling and organise to either paint it myself or have it painted at our expense.

So, I am demanding R1000 as his half of my "Management Fee" for the last 16 - 18 months, I do not think this is unreasonable (this amount is based on an estimate of my personal time spent, phone calls to lawyers, estate agents, tenants, plumbers, electricians and the new owner and petrol driving backwards and forwards to the unit every time something needs doing). Keep in mind that I'm currently holding R12000 of his hostage until this final "painting the ceiling" issue has been resolved. There are more emails currently being exchanged (pah, he thinks he can make demands from all the way in the UK). But this is all weighing very heavily on my mind. By the time he went to the UK, we were not dating, we were not friends, we were only business partners. But I feel like he has completely taken advantage of our previous closeness in forcing me into a situation where I have had to be responsible for all of the house-related things ... but he still get's half the profit!

Sigh, I never thought I would so look forward to never speaking to someone again! But thanks to Daddio, Varen and JofH for listening to my vents and providing me with much needed support and cool-headedness when dealing with this frustrating situation.

The Ebb and Flow of Real Life

So it's been a quick week. Well at least it feels like it. Work is a very weird place for me at the moment. There are somethings I'm really enjoying about it and there are others that I know are destructive and no good for me and I need to get away from it. #sigh I dunno how you solve that short of getting a new job. But again, there is the out of the frying pan into the fire factor. That and it's not exactly an ideal time ... I'm just hearing of too many retrenchments stories and what not.

Speaking of which, I'm on the hunt again for a new tenant for the little Studio apartment. My tenant got retrenched and now can't complete her lease period. Have only had 1 person show any interest in the place this whole week (with ads on Private Property and Gumtree!). Showing it to her this weekend. Fingers crossed.

Anyway, Monday was a really nice evening, went out with a bunch of the people from our old company (ie. before the merger) for a farewell dinner for someone who was leaving. Was a really nice bunch and I enjoyed it. We went to Doppio in the new Sandton (Protea Court - which to me sounds like a Hotel, honestly ... I was a little confused at first). Very nice, really. Although from what I saw it just looks like they put in a ton of escalators! Haha.

On Tuesday I had an early dinner and swung past Montecasino to collect a gift my mom had sent up with a friend. She bought me Sarah Graham's Bitten cookbook. Which I've wanted since I made those Sweetcorn & Sweet Potato Fritters. Which is amusing to me now that I am on this eating plan ... #sigh. Although that in itself is actually going quite well. I'm sticking with the 1 breakfast & 2 dinner cheats a week and I've been pretty stable. Weekends are hard tho. Actually quite a few days are hard. I find it difficult that you can't just eat or snack as you please ... because obviously then you either eat too much in a day or eat the wrong things. But I do miss my Super M Chocolate Milks.

On Wednesday I had my annual Doctor's Day. It was nice to be off work in the chaos. Had a lazy morning at home with a bit of a lie-in. Headed off to my appointments and for the first time ever I barely had to wait at all (of course, because I had lugged my book along for that very purpose). And my appointments were all under 15mins. Yes, and it still costs R900 #sigh Being a girl is expensive. But everything is all good and I got my repeat scrips. Turns out I'll also be on my Allergy-related Asthma maintenance meds for *ever*. I was kinda hoping that now that it was under control, and it is, the difference to my life is actually astounding. I'm a little sorry it took me so long to get it managed properly! But anyhoo, the meds are the only way to continue this easy-breathing, no-morning-coughing-up-a-lung existence. So I guess I pay and medicate. Such is life.

So with everything done in such an unusually expedient manner, I spent my afternoon doing a spot of gardening. Sheesh it is sweaty work. Laying down more lawn-dressing and composting the plant beds in the hope that I can give the plants a little bit of an edge on the bunnies - haha, wishful thinking!

That evening, The Trucker was supposed to be having dinner with @Toxic_Mouse so I invited CollegeInstructor over for dinner. Was good to catch up since we've both been away :) The Trucker's plans fell thru and he ended up joining us as well. Was a good evening but definitely proved to me that I need a new home computer :( *sob* The expenses are just racking up. Also need to do my car service this month. Life is expensive lately. I've tried to break the house stuff I want to do down into bite-sized affordable chunks so that at least I'm doing a little something each month ... was supposed to be with the money I was saving when I paid off my car. Yes, that giant residual payment has to be made this month too! That's going to be an expensive day. But seems there are so many other things cropping up that are more urgent than the house ... #beinganadult. Urgh.

On Thursday, The Trucker finished work early and actually came over for a proper evening (has been a pretty disjointed week). We made dinner together and watched some series. He did some work and I lazed in a bath and read my book. Ah, bliss.

And that has pretty much been my week. Not much planned for the weekend, but I have booked a Surprise (my surprise for him this time) Date Night with The Trucker for Saturday evening. I guess the Date Night isn't really the surprise. The surprise is more in us each trying to one-up each other with the restaurants we try. And I have a good long list waiting for me ;) So if you have been to any amazing restaurants in Joburg lately and think they're worth a visit, leave me a comment :) Am always on the lookout!

Post-Holiday Blues

Sigh. I did not wake up feeling happy this morning. Rather I was quite overwhelmed with the whole real-life-ness of everything. I can't remember when I felt like this (no doubt sometime back when I was dating Varen and my life was *far* more mundane and I spent ages wondering if that was as good as it got ... but luckily it wasn't!).

I can only put this down to post-holiday blues. But honestly, if I thought I could've gotten away with it, I would've switched off the alarm and stayed in bed and panic-ed all day about all the grown-up adult and responsible things that need doing in life (even more so now that I've spent a blissful 3 weeks far from thinking about any of them!). Omg, I own an apartment again. And my tenant has just moved out (her lease with the previous owner was up at the end of August and she decided not to renew it because while I was waiting for transfer to go thru, she put an offer in on her own place which she's moving to instead ... which makes total sense, but sucks for me!). So I have a month to find myself a new tenant. Sigh. Admin. I have to sort out my Tax (urgh). I have to get round to booking all those annoying annual doctors/dentist visits.

And then there is all the day-to-day nonsense that I'm avoiding. Yes, not every day is the same, and let's be honest, my life could be more boring ... by midday yesterday I had plans for every evening this week until Saturday! (Sheesh).

I'm sure this too will pass, as life just rolls on and things just happen and it all just has to get done (let's just take it one day at a time, okay?). But honestly, I'd often rather just hide away and ignore all the responsible things.

Wobble

Ever have those days where you wake up and think: This is my life. I think I am having a responsibility crisis. They happen every so often (and they disappear quickly, it's like a momentary-as-you-wake-up wobble). I dunno if I can quite explain it. But I guess it comes from knowing I'm about to spend a chunk of cash in a very short amount of time when I pay for both my tours and my flights in the next few days, the fact that I am toying with buying a place that I can actually live in and the phone call from my tenant saying he wants to move in with a friend of his but he'll find someone to take over his lease (hmmm, these seem all money related). But that's what responsibility is, isn't it?

Sigh, all of these are awesome things (except for the tenant issue, but I have no doubt that'll be resolved). But they're scary adult things. I dunno, I'm not usually this worried about spending on my holidays (and this is a very average costing trip for me actually). But the house thing is weighing on my mind. I want a space I can settle in. But I have some serious constraints, like all the furniture I own and the bunnies. And because of the flat, I have some serious budget constraints ... and I have some very snobby area-requirements - haha. I dunno, I'm sure everything will work itself out and I know my mood won't last, but I woke up with it weighing heavily on me this morning.

On Monday night SCM Dinner was in @clairam's new home. And it is awesome and amazing and I spent the whole night amazed at how grown up this house was. Sigh (no doubt that also has to do with this morning's mood?). And last night I wasn't in the mood for anything and so I climbed under my duvet, with dessert (note: before dinner!) and watched Moulin Rouge. It was actually a kinda perfect evening.

Going Well

So far it has been a pretty awesome week. Went to 27Dinner with @tfrayne and @levonrivers and got to see the new Samsung Galaxy Tab up close. Very cute. Smaller than the iPad and includes a phone and a camera, which apparently the iPad lack. Although the iPad is a little big to function as a phone. Not that I'm likely to get either, quite honestly. What on earth would I do with it? Apparently BB is bringing out a tablet too ... I'll probably be in need of an upgrade by then ;) Haha. Surprisingly, I am so not swayed by gadgetry, I wouldn't even have my blackberry if Varen hadn't actually bought it for me.

But, before the 27Dinner, I met up with my first prospective tenant from my Private Property listing and I can happily report that I'll be handing over the keys and he'll be signing the lease this evening. Yippee. (Note: this is the news that has actually made the week awesome). I can't believe it all happened so quickly. I mean the advert only started showing on the 23rd. Sigh, and now I wonder why I faffed around and put it off all month. But at least it is done and I've got a tenant for the next 12 months :)

Keep Those Fingers Crossed

So this week has not slowed down even for a second. It has been awesome so far ... but I expect there'll be an emotional crash shortly. No one can maintain a high permanently. In the mean time tho, I'm just enjoying the rush of good feeling :)

So, on Tuesday night I introduced @WhizBangLouLou to the sushi spot in Cedar Square, to let her in on the delish secret of those strawberry, cheese and salmon rainbow rolls. Oh, so good!

And yesterday I got the call. The call from the agent. The Owner has accepted my offer!! (and I re-read this blog post from March 2010 ... so surreal, haha) He did add in an additional condition of sale tho. But hopefully it'll just end up being completely irrelevant. He had actually already sold this property but that Buyer couldn't get finance so it fell thru. So now it basically says he can continue to accept offers up until the point my bond is approved. And if he does get another offer I have 48hrs to match it or lose the deal.

As such I have already mailed off all my bond docs to the Bond Consultant. Let's hope this dude works some speedy magic and gets everything happily approved and sorted asap. They are hoping to have everything signed, sealed and on the go before the 31 August so I can give 2 months notice where I'm renting now. OMG, I might be moving to my very own home on 01 November.

I will say tho, Bond Applications scare the shit out of me. They are terrifying. And I'm more terrified right now because last time I tried to get a bond while I already had one (back in 2007), it was declined :( So yes, literally the next few days are going to have me on the edge of my seat waiting to hear and being very nervy. Sigh. As much as I 100% completely believe that this house is meant to be mine, there is a small dark corner of my brain worrying that I'm just setting myself up for a giant disappointment :( Anyhoo, for now we're keeping absolutely positive, because, how on earth could this not happen?! ;)

The other good news arrived in a surprise email from my current tenant, who's lease is up at the end of October. She asked if I had found another tenant yet because she has a friend who is keen to rent the unit and will sign a 12month lease (depending on how much I was planning on increasing the rental). How fantastic will that be? So finger's crossed for that too.

I was meant to be seeing The Trucker for dinner but he ended up driving his sister (it was her bday) to their mom's (in the Free State) for an overnight visit instead. Which turned out to be a good thing. I spent the evening getting my Bond Application docs sorted and finishing the last of what I needed for Tax 2011. An admin evening, but a much needed one :)

First Week Back

So, as I said before, being home means being back to crazy busy weeks :) Which is awesome ... although it does mean that the house is still covered on all the non-clothes items I unpacked on Saturday and haven't sorted thru yet. Terrible, I know.

But I have been slowly making a bit of a dent in my #365 project. In a lot of ways, it's as hard as doing the blog posts because there are so many photos to choose from for each day. But I'm up to the 12th August so far.

On Monday night I went to SCM Dinner. It was lovely to be back, especially since @clairam made a truly delish goulash! Although there was a fairly small crowd there, most of whom I'd already caught up with on Saturday evening.

> Follow @clairam on Twitter:

On Tuesday evening I went to @jarredcinman's for another delish dinner (yay, have not yet had to buy a single grocery since arriving home ;) ). He made us a *very* nice Vegan pasta dish (although he specially bought some feta for me!) and I took along a very nice bottle of wine. It was an awesome catch-up evening and I took my laptop along to show him the photos (his request, ordinarily I would never bore anyone with *all* of them). Had a bit of a panic attack because I hadn't been thru all my pics yet and I noticed quite a few were missing. Checked the baby-camera when I got home and they're all still on there (and this is why I *never* delete holiday photos immediately!), but hadn't copied across. Seems the battery had run out so haven't yet been able to get them safely off there. But have decided that this weekend I'm going to have to invest in a new storage drive for my photos, the laptop is just about full! I suspect it has to do with the images being so much bigger these days and the fact that I'm taking multitudes more since starting my #365. Will be good to have them all backed up somewhere too.

> Follow @jarredcinman on Twitter:

And then last night I went to *finally* watch Inception, which actually opened just before I left. Couldn't believe it was still showing ... more so tho, I couldn't believe I wasn't the only person in the cinema at the 17h45 show. How annoying. It was like going to watch a normal-time movie. Pfft.

But, the movie was quite brilliant. What a fun concept. The only thing I think they did wrong was to start the movie with a scene from the end. Often it works quite well to set a movie up, but by the end I felt like it had just been a waste in this movie and entirely unnecessary. And I will admit it took a while to figure out what was going on as they only explained some things later in the movie, but I that I'm entirely okay with :) Seriously if you haven't (cause clearly I wasn't the last person in the world to go see it, as I was expecting), go and watch it.

And after the movie I popped round to my new little studio apartment. I hadn't seen it since I'd put the offer in way back in March. The old tenant had brought the keys round on Tuesday after she'd moved out and had the place cleaned. Wow, even at night I still like the place. I even had a moment of wondering if I could in fact move in there myself ... okay it would mean putting a fair amount of stuff that I bought this year into storage, it only being a studio, but it's not as tiny as I remembered it. And the garden is probably about as big as the bed-lounge area of the unit too. Sigh, but although it's not *miles* away, it's the wrong side of traffic for me and I'm not sure I could live with that! But yay, I'm glad to still be happy with my purchase :) So if anyone is looking for a little garden studio apartment to rent in Lonehill, drop me an email. I'm on the hunt for a new tenant.

And tonight I'm off to another dinner with friends :)

I Put In an Offer!

Wowee, so I did it. Yesterday I went to see the Garden Unit a second time (just to make sure it was a good spot and I wasn't swayed by the tenant's gorgeous furniture!) and I signed an offer for the place!!

I know, it was quite a surprise for me too. Well, only in the sense that I signed it there and then, I think I knew since Sunday I'd be signing an offer on one of the two units. Shoo, I won't lie, I did wake up in a panic at 04h30 this morning, wondering if I'd done the right thing. But in the bright light of day I'm still happy with my decision :)

I feel like it's going to be a good week. Well, I did before I went to check if my dining-room table credit card reversal had shown up on my online statement yet (it hasn't!) and then I went to check if my car license renewal cheque had been deducted yet (I posted it like 2 weeks ago!!) and it hasn't either :( So I'm not thrilled. There's nothing I hate more than the idea of dealing with a government department (except perhaps SARS or having to go into an actual bank branch!). These license renewal things terrify me cause you have to send the form in with the cheque ... so now how on earth do i prove I've sent it off. And I can't resend it or anything because I don't have the document anymore. *panic stations* sigh.

Anyway, I will remain positive and upbeat while I wait to hear if my offer was accepted (because the owner is in Cape Town, she's got till next Monday).

08h11 Update: Got hold of the Randburg Licensing department (a miracle in itself, I know!) and my license was paid last Wednesday! *relief* Silly me, I checked the wrong bank account for my cheque (I only use them once a year to pay my license registration, so forgot the cheque book is attached to my old account!). Now to just get hold of Madisons :P

11h25 Update: My offer just got accepted!!

Average

It's been an average week. A quiet night on Monday. SCM on Tuesday. And The Trucker & I went for sushi last night. It took the longest time ever and was not the best sushi experience I've had there (Cedar Square, why go anywhere else when you can get strawberry, salmon, avo & cream cheese rainbow rolls :) )

This morning we started work with a team breakfast at Europa ... so it has been a crazy busy morning trying to catch-up with work already. And I've been a bit sick the last 2 days. Which is annoying because I never get sick, and The Trucker seems to take great joy in pointing this out every time I have gotten sick this year so far :P I think this has been my sickest year ever (which really only includes a bout of tonsillitis and food poisoning :P So I don't think it's that bad going!)! Either way, I am ploughing my way thru a box of strepsils and medlemons and tissues at the moment. But I do feel better today than I did yesterday, so that's gotta count for something.

I am also feeling *very* poor! Paid both property attorneys now and my savings account is resembling my current account :( *sob* But I know it'll get back on track eventually ... But I am hoping my next salary comes round asap!

Oh, and I met with 3 interested potential new tenants from my investment property last night. That went well. But it is so funny how your "top contenders" change after you meet the people. I think I've pretty much already chosen my new tenant, honestly. But will wait for the credit check to come back before we sign anything :)

Did I ever go on Holiday?

Wow, already my second Monday back at work. Last week just flew by!

On Thursday I went to JBs corner and had a lovely catch-up dinner with some friends. On Friday evening I was only going to pop past a friend from work's birthday for a quick drink, but it ended up being great fun with loads of us from work there and I ended up staying a lot later than I'd expected.

I didn't wake up feeling 100% on Saturday morning and so lazed in bed quite a bit longer than I was expecting since I had plenty of admin planned. Went to buy TheBundles a new hay bale and dropped my SLR off at CameraTek for a service and proper clean (should hear on Tuesday how much that is gonna end up costing me - yikes!). It is going to cause a bit of a problem for the #365 tho since I won't get it back for a good 8-10 days. And I had a bit of a look at what was available in the little point 'n click market at the moment since mine officially needs replacing after this trip. It was freaking useless a lot of the time. I think the auto-focus mechanism went because it just used to shake once switched on. Which I think is ridiculous since it's not very old ... although perhaps 2&half years is a fair enough age for a point 'n click. Plus mine does travel a fair amount ;)

And then CollegeInstructor and I headed off to have a look at hard drives. I decided I desperately need some form of storage for all these photos since my laptop is almost completely full now. We each got ourselves a Samsung 1.5Tb External Drive from Makro who were selling it on promotion for R899. Hahaha, so far I still have over a Tb of free space on it, after copying my Photos and Music folders across. Yay.

We also went round to see my new little apartment again. I wanted to see it in the daylight. Still thrilled with it, but really must now get a move on with the new-tenant-hunt because I have decided that there really is no way I can live there myself. The traffic from Lonehill would cause me to die a slow daily death :P

Later on Saturday afternoon I headed off to Cool Runnings to meet up with the SCM Dinner crew for a birthday bash which started with watching the Rugby. We won't discuss that ;) I didn't end up staying too late. I was completely exhausted from my week and still not feeling great so decided that at home and in bed with series would be a far better use of my time :) And it really was.

On Sunday CollegeInstructor and I went to Doppio Zero for breakfast. He, TheHousemate and a few other people had had rather a large night so were all suffering a little I think. Urgh. Doppio irritates me. It's like I have to go back there every few months to remind myself that I don't actually like the place since they took my favourite breakfast off the menu :(

Later that afternoon (after some running about trying to find new fairy lights, which is no easy feat), I went to visit @saulkza and @Nadgia at their new home. They haven't moved in just yet, but the renovations are finished and the place is looking *amazing* :) We finished off the evening with dinner at Piza e Vino. It wasn't as awesome as I remembered it from my first meal there, but still pretty yummy pizzas :)

> Follow @saulkza on Twitter:

> Follow @Nadgia on Twitter:

So, yes, as usual ... I spent the weekend eating out - hahaha. And this week isn't going to be any less busy than last week. Shoo.

Second Anniversary

Mkay, I think things are on the up ... I know I left you hanging last week with a rather down in the dumps post :(

On Thursday evening we headed to one of The Trucker's oldest friend's houses ... he was out for a week from Bermuda for his brother's wedding. Yes, I finally got to meet the guy we're off to visit in Bermuda for a week in September :) We had quite a cool evening. @Toxic_Mouse and his girlf were there too. And we ate some delish home-made prawn & chicken curry.

On Friday it was my 2 year anniversary with The Trucker. Now there was definitely a time when I didn't think we'd get here, and yes, despite the exactly 2 months apart, I still consider this our anniversary. But we did get here and it was worth celebrating. Not quite in the style of last year - haha, that was amazing. This year because we had such a busy week planned, we just went for dinner at Licorish. We have booked a weekend away in June tho ... am so looking forward to it :)

Dinner was superb, as always. Although, on arrival I was unimpressed with the menu's. I don't remember if they were like that last time, but the newspapery-feel doesn't suit the restaurant, I don't think. The restaurant is far more impressive and classy and the newspapery menu's just don't tie in with that at all. But anyway, that aside, I started with a Chocolate Chilli Martini. It was nice, but not very strong ... chilli or chocolate wise.

Then we shared a starter of Goats cheese samoosa with balsamic onion jam, yellow pepper essence and pumpkin seed cinnamon dukkah. This was superb (and there were 2 on the plate which suited us perfectly). For mains, The Trucker had the fillet taster plate and I had the game taster plate. Mine consisted of an Ostrich puff-pastry tart, which had far too many mushrooms for my liking, a Springbok Spring Roll, which I rather liked, and a piece of Kudu fillet served of sweet potato mash. I couldn't finish it all but it was all very nice. And with that we had the wine tasters. My favourite (wish I knew what it was) was the one served with the kudu.

We finished with Chocolate spring rolls with cape velvet custard to share. So full!

Shame, The Trucker has been sicker than I remember him ever being. Off work for 2 days (this boy never takes a day off! Even when he should) and just plain exhausted, sore and drained the whole weekend. So we didn't get anything done house-wise this weekend. We need to get the ceiling sorted before his sister moves in ... it's gotta be this weekend. Eep.

We had the maid over on Saturday morning to get the old house cleaned up and ready for it's new tenant. And The Trucker slept most of the morning. Poor guy. And then it was time to get ready for the wedding. It was at Avianto, which I've never been to. Quite a nice venue. We had a lovely time but left early because The Trucker was still feeling awful.

We slept late on Sunday and had a lazy morning and breakfast at home before heading out to do the grocery shopping. And then spent a nice lazy afternoon at home. I think this is what we needed ... although The Trucker has spent quite a lot of time already there ... maybe it's what I needed. He thinks the woman who owned it died there. Her son, who we are renting from, said she got alzheimers so couldn't stay there anymore. I think, for me, it's just that I haven't really figured out my place there yet. I know that sounds crazy. Our roles haven't really changed in the house. We do a lot together. But I guess, it's exacerbated by him having spent so much time there. I feel out of place. At my house, it was mine, I was sorta more in control of the place, I knew where things were ... I'd put them there. I know, it sounds crazy, but I hadn't cooked a single thing in this house after a whole week there ... well, not really. I'd only done my first load of washing there on Saturday. It is silly, but I think I'm getting over it :)

Anyway, so on Sunday I finally got to use my SCM Gift. Although The Trucker had unpacked it and been using it all week, which cause another upset ... it was my gift and still in it's box, I kinda wanted to use it first. Not that I would ever stop him using it after that whenever he wanted ... but I dunno, him using it first rubbed me up all the wrong way and I had to seriously force myself to actually use it at all after that because I was so annoyed. Maybe it's just me that feels like that about things?

So for lunch on Sunday I made us Roasted Strawberry, Brie and Chocolate Grilled Cheese. I won't lie, it wasn't as epic as I was hoping for. I used that thin rye bread from Woolies, I wouldn't do that again. I also wouldn't use brie again. It was too strong (perhaps I used too much). I would go with something more neutral, like Goat's Cheese next time. The melty Lindt 70% and the strawberries were pretty good tho :)

We made ostrich burgers for dinner and made a serious dent in Game of Thrones S3. I am bored. Again, too many characters I couldn't care about, you don't even see every character in each episode. It is far too much to remember who every one is and who is a good guy or a bad guy. We finished The Following this weekend too (The Trucker is not a fan of Serial-Killer Sundays). This started out great, but I am not convinced. It's all just a bit too fantastical for me because while I enjoy Kevin Bacon's character and his storyline, I just can't get behind the whole Joe Carroll thing.

The problem with #TheFollowing is that i can't wrap my head around why anyone would a) put up with, let alone b) follow this idiot guy #sigh
— phillygirl (@philly_girl) May 17, 2013

And that was our weekend. We're having a quiet week this week. Neither of us has made plans for the week or the weekend ... we need some time at home, together.

The Brutal Art by Jesse Kellerman

Ethan Muller is struggling to establish his reputation as a dealer in the cut-throat world of contemporary art when he is alerted to a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: in a decaying New York slum, an elderly tenant has disappeared, leaving behind a staggeringly large trove of original drawings and paintings. Nobody can tell Ethan much about the old man, except that he came and went in solitude for nearly forty years, his genius hidden and unacknowledged. Despite the fact that, strictly speaking, the artwork doesn't belong to him, Ethan takes the challenge and makes a name for the old man - and himself. Soon Ethan has to congratulate himself on his own genius: for storytelling and salesmanship. But suddenly the police are interested in talking to him. It seems that the missing artist had a nasty past, and the drawings hanging in the Muller Gallery have begun to look a lot less like art and a lot more like evidence. Sucked into an investigation four decades cold, Ethan will uncover a secret legacy of shame and death, one that will touch horrifyingly close to home - and leave him fearing for his own life.

This book had such promise. Aside from the immense detail down irrelevant avenues, the core story of the artist and his link to Ethan's own family is good. But unfulfilled in the end. The story pretty much goes where you expect in terms of "the link" but never really comes to fruition in a substantial enough way.

So it was a good read, but not a great read. I must say I definitely prefer his father's Alex Delaware novels.

The Host by Stephenie Meyer

Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away. The earth has been invaded by a species that takes over the minds of their human hosts while leaving their bodies intact, and most of humanity has succumbed. Wanderer, the invading 'soul' who has been given Melanie's body, knew about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the too-vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn't expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind. Melanie fills Wanderer's thoughts with visions of the man Melanie loves - Jared, a human who still lives in hiding. Unable to separate herself from her body's desires, Wanderer yearns for a man she's never met. As outside forces make Wanderer and Melanie unwilling allies, they set off to search for the man they both love.

Okay, I know this took me absolute ages to read, but I loved it. Really, far far better than the Twilight series. I would seriously recommend this book, even if Twilight doesn't appeal to you, don't be swayed by that, this is *nothing* like it.

Transferred

So on Wednesday the girls came round for our monthly Poker night and I had the most rubbish poker evening ever :P Thank goodness the company was good so it wasn't a total waste ;) Honestly, I think I only had one hand where both my cards were over 10 ... makes for very dull poker when you justifiably fold every hand!!

Anyway, and then yesterday I got the most amazing news, that little Studio Apartment I bought *finally* transferred into my name. I am now officially a home-owner again :) And I'm panic-ing just a little about what I need to figure out before I go, but other than getting the tenant's contact details from the now-previous owner, it should all be fine. Shoo. It actually happened, seems a little unreal at this point.

And then last night I was supposed to be meeting another boy from Internet Dating (after our first plan to meet on Sunday got postponed), but it got postponed again. He has had good reasons, but I'm losing interest with all this shuffling about. And honestly I don't have the time to see him before I leave now. So we'll see. Have decided to ignore any and all boy-related stuffs till after my return. Instead I ended up going to Panarotti's with TheHousemate. Things have been a bit weird there and we've hardly seen or spoken to each other in the last few weeks so it was nice to get things a bit more back to normal. Plus, I hadn't been to Panarotti's with him in so long, I'd forgotten why I don't actually like the place ;) Hahaha.

On that note, this time next week, I'll be at ORT with my Ageing Aunt waiting for our flight (hopefully having already checked in and eating a yummy breakfast!). Sheesh, it's soon now :)

Restful

Well it was another pretty quiet weekend. No socialising. On Friday evening The Trucker came over and we watched Children of Men again.

On Saturday we breakfasted at home and then he headed off to do some work while I went to meet a prospective new tenant. Hold thumbs, people. After that, I think we had a lazy afternoon while he worked a bit and I rewatched Splice. Movies are rarely as good the second time around #sigh.

In the evening I'd booked dinner for us (Surprise Date Night) at Lucky Bean. I haven't been since it was still called Soulsa. The place looked pretty much empty when we arrived, The Trucker was a bit nervous. But it filled up quickly and was buzzing. We started with their amazing Haloumi. Man, that is as good as I remembered it. Yum. And then I had their Springbok Pie. Can never pass that up ;) It was good, but not spectacular. There was also only the merest hint of veg served with it. Anyway, it was a good evening. Love that boy <3

On Sunday we had a lazy morning and a quick breakfast out before doing the weekly grocery shop. In the afternoon we took The Trucker's ex-girlf's dogs for a walk and picnic at Golden Harvest.

Okay, I know it sounds super weird. But they were once his dogs too and so, since he lives in the same complex as her, when shes away he dog-sits (she's in Thailand for a week). I'm over (*all*) the weirdness in that sentence, but don't misunderstand, it took plenty of time to reach this zen state. They really are lovely dogs tho and he adores & misses them.

Was a great way to spend the afternoon while I read my book in the sun and he ran around the field with them :)

And that was pretty much all the excitement of the weekend. Oh, except I did finally buy some fairy lights for my verandah (PnP has them on sale at the moment ... old stock, I presume) and got The Trucker to hang my hose pipe thing (bought it like when I moved in and it has been lying around since then!) and the trellis for the jasmine I planted under my bedroom window :)

Everything Else

Hmmm, the rest of the week has been okay so far. Got the lease signed and sealed with my new tenant :) Am super excited about this whole thing. And am kinda going to miss my little place ... not that I ever did more than pop in there to visit it about 4 times, but I think it's super cute and I love the little garden. All this makes me quite sure it was the exactly right purchase for me, even if I'll probably never live in it because it goes against my "inside the highway" rule.

Anyway, on Wednesday evening was our (now less than monthly) Poker night with the girls. I have been having the weirdest poker nights lately, I either have an awesome lucky evening or I have an evening where I fold ever hand as completely unplayable and go out on blinds alone. Luckily Wednesday was a lucky night for me and I won. I had two very memorable hands. One I shouldn't have been in for the amount I was betting on a hope (there were only 2 of us left playing so stakes were higher and I was feeling reckless trying to get to a final winner), but I got my flush on the river card :) And then one was *awesome* ... for the first time in our little group's poker playing history, we had to look up online to figure out who'd won. Landed up with 2 full houses, luckily I had the one with the higher set of 3. Shoo. Exciting stuffs.

Yesterday was not as exciting. I ended up going to Panarotti's with CollegeInstructor and France because my plans had been postponed. Please remind me, I do NOT like the place (or their adverts, which should be reason enough on it's own to never go back) and should not bother going back. Ever. Again. Ever. Sigh.

Is trying desperately to avoid a #vagueblogpost moment, so won't say anymore about what is swirling in my head right now. But feels a "Saved to Draft" blog post coming ... I'm not a believer in the password-protected post (even if blogger could even do it?!), since it's either for the world at large or it's not. It's never for merely a select few ... well, unless they're the real people in my life and then honestly, that's what conversation is for, and not a blog post :P

Oh, and I have some Bundle stuffs for you today :) I took some video of Coal playing with my keys this week and then put together a little video from 3 clips I had of her and Lily playing with things: Lily with the picnic blanket (they don't burrow under it like they used to when they were little anymore tho), Coal with an empty plastic bottle and then with my keys. The videos aren't great quality, they're taken with my bb, but they are good enough for their purpose :) And I managed to get a photo of Coal "playing" with me ... which actually means chewing on my clothes. Luckily she has never chewed right thru anything or I probably wouldn't find it nearly as cute :)

It's Wet

Yes, it's still raining. And as much as I loved the entire day of rain on Sunday (when I could stay snug inside in my pajamas), the novelty is wearing off fast! It seems to make Varen & I both very lazy. We snuggled up in bed while I read my book and he dozed. Damn but it was hard to get up and go to gym!

But we did. We haven't lost any weight yet ... I figure it's our bodies adjusting to eating 6 times a day. That and I don't think we're quite figured out exactly how little "a portion" is :) But we had the Macaroni Cheese for dinner last night and it wasn't too bad at all - needed a little more flavour, but that was quickly solved with a spoon of salsa ;)

And in other news, people continue to disappoint (or lie as I like to call it). The Rent has still not been paid. The Tenant assures me it'll be done today. For some reason she cannot understand that I just want her to tell me the truth for a change ... not that I'd believe it. Crying wolf, and all. So I keep phoning and bugging her because I figure it's the only way to get her to understand that there is no benefit in saying today if it's not going to be done today ... since it means I'll just phone her again tomorrow. Clearly my phone calls don't bother her one bit tho.

And then the new Floor Guy who actually came all the way to our house to assess the damage, he still has not emailed the quote. I mean really? What exactly does he think we can do without the quote? Without the quote, him actually assessing the floor has been a complete waste of time!

And currently Varen & I are looking at getting ourselves a pet ... yes, I'm caving. But not a dog. We're going to start with dwarf bunnies :) And the guy was supposed to send some information via email. Do you think he did? Nope. Maybe Varen's email address is just too complicated for all these people?

Quiet Evenings Are Just As Fun

Although I didn't go for lunch with my ex-colleagues yesterday (we're onto our 4th postponement now, I think?) and because of such late notice, I didn't have dinner with PerfectOnPaper either (we had a tentative arrangement in the likely event that my lunch got postponed, but by the time I found out he had other plans for the evening ... but we're on for dinner next Tuesday instead), it still turned out to be a pretty awesome day (after work, as mentioned in yesterday's post, it wasn't the ideal work-day).

I finally got hold of the Estate Agent at my *new* Number 1 property (since I have decided I don't want the one I saw on Monday). She's making an arrangement with the tenant so that I can go see the actual unit I'm interested in buying (will hopefully be sometime this week!). Is very exciting, I could very shortly be a home owner. In fact I know I will. I've pretty much decided that I'm buying one of these units, it's now just about picking which one. I am hoping for the last ground floor garden (not really a garden more like a little courtyard where you can have some pot plants, a braai etc. which obviously makes it infinitely more appealing than one with a teeny balcony) unit. But will happily settle on a 1st floor unit if it doesn't meet my standards ... I don't have to live there and as we've already established, not everyone has the same requirements of a home as I do.

And then since Beukes and I were both going to be home last night we invited DJMike around to see our new place (he's been in the UK pretty much since the weekend I moved). We had Nando's for dinner and then sat around on the blue lounge floor drinking wine and catching up :) Good times.

For those of you not up to speed on the story, DJMike and The Peeb were in pre-school together and thru that our family's became friends. Then DJMike and Beukes met and became best friends in primary school ... and that's how we three all fit together :)

Windows Safe Mode

Right, so I was wrong. This week hasn't been the spectacular return to normal that I had hoped for :(

It's an improvement on last week only in that we've only fought once. But it feels like we're running in Windows Safe Mode. We fought again, over something ridiculous (I was trying to help, he was dismissive) on Monday evening, which spiraled into more not speaking to each other. Well no more than cursory. I don't think it was at all related to the immediate incident and more just the crushing weight of exhaustion at fighting with each other in general over the last week. We seem fine when not in the house tho ...

On Monday, beforehand, we'd spent about an hour back at my old place peeling and scraping the paint off the ceiling together and polyfilla-ing where the old light fittings had been in preparation to get it re-painted this week before his sister moves in this weekend. We managed to do that just fine together.

So Tuesday he went to cricket and I stayed home. Honestly I think I needed a night in at this new house on my own. I actually haven't really spent any alone time there yet really. I had a lot of alone time in my old house, time to settle myself in.

I moved things around, probably a few things that I shouldn't have since they were too heavy. But I was working thru my annoyance & frustration and I wasn't about to wait around for him to get home to do what needed doing. There are some things he's fantastic at getting done (take my ceiling for example, or in fact, the whole move in general) but, the little things, the random things I want done, seem to sit around waiting forever.

He hasn't commented on any of the changes I made ... Mostly they were in our new outside area. Which is usually my happy place and not really somewhere he spends too much time. He probably got this out of his system by setting up the TV and sound system in the lounge :) Anyway, I felt better for it.

Things were better yesterday, but we're still not talking to each other "properly". We're being polite and we are talking. But as I said, it feels like we're running in Safe Mode. A lot of that is me, I know. I need to re-connect with him, but I can't find a way to do it yet. He's occasionally hugging me, or holding my hand on the couch while we quietly watch TV together. But we're not talking about any of the little things, the things that happened in our day or anything like that. I hate it. I know it won't last much longer ... I will cave. It won't be resolved, it'll just disappear because who has the energy to maintain being annoyed or angry for so long? And life will somehow swing back to normal. For now tho, I still feel heavy and like I'm seeing the world thru blue-tinted glasses :(

Yesterday Gypsy got spayed. I went home early from work with a headache, took some meds, got some sleep and then collected her. She was a bit funny last night (to be expected), unusually quiet and slow. But she did eat, which made me happy :) She seems closer to normal this morning. Sweet thing. (The Trucker just Whatsapp-ed me a recording of her purring <3 ) She reminds me of a Silverback Gorilla in this photo - haha. Must've been the light thru the trees because she definitely doesn't have any sliver-grey fur.

Yesterday I also had someone come in and prime the ceiling and paint. Unfortunately we didn't buy enough paint so The Trucker went to buy more after work and then went and painted on the second coat (see, he is pretty amazing, and I know I'm actually really lucky) and I went thru about an hour later with the vacuum and what not to clean up.

Aargh. By the time I got there the paint was already peeling and falling off the ceiling again ?!? I don't know what we'll do about it. (The photo is of the new paint peeling already!)

And the new tenant's at his old place canceled yesterday (they never actually signed the lease and found somewhere else). Which also means if he can't find someone else, he will be paying another month's rent there :(

Life is not awesome right now. Where is that light at the end of this tunnel?

Oh, there were one or two highlights this week actually: First, I finally received my birthday gift from The Peeb. She knitted me some fingerless gloves :) They are pretty cool. The only downside is they are completely different sizes. And only one fits snugly enough to be wearable. :( Hopefully she'll re-knit me the other one because actually just last week I was thinking it may finally be time to replace my current, rather old ones, which I wear pretty much every day in winter ... fingers get cold typing on computers and moving the mouse around.

And @Arkwife introduced me to Chilli Popper Toasties. OMG. I am in love. Cream cheese, sliced Jalepenos and grated cheddar cheese ... it's a winner, folks. I made it for myself for dinner on Tuesday evening. I even made one to share as a starter last night for The Trucker to try. This weekend we're adding bacon :)